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Chef Donald Gonzalez of Forepaugh’s named one of the most humble Chefs in town in the new City Pages list!

If you think of Forepaugh’s, you might think about wedding banquets, Victorian architecture, and the ghost that famously, supposedly, haunts the space. (For his part, Don Gonzalez says he doesn’t like to think too much about it — he works

If you think of Forepaugh’s, you might think about wedding banquets, Victorian architecture, and the ghost that famously, supposedly, haunts the space. (For his part, Don Gonzalez says he doesn’t like to think too much about it — he works odd hours and doesn’t want to get freaked out.) But peruse the menu — or should we say menus; there are at least half a dozen different ones going at all times — and you will forget about bland banquet fare and chafers of warmed-over eggs.

Instead you’ll be thinking about things like chermoula flatbread, Malaysian samosas, Chinese longbeans, or a Cubano. Beef Wellington is there, too, and all the steaks your suburban dad with an expense account wants to eat, and eggs Benedict and even cheesy potatoes. Gonzalez grew up in a family of female cooks, with an English grandma who made him coddled eggs and toast points, and a Puerto Rican mother who told him if he didn’t like something to cook it his damn self. So he did. And he kept doing it until he got it right. Forepaugh’s is famous, yes, but not because there’s a name chef prancing around an open kitchen. T

he kitchen is actually in the basement, where all old-fashioned kitchens were once situated, and that’s where you will find Gonzalez. And if you really want to get a look at that ghost, remember that she was a chambermaid and if she’s anywhere, she’s probably in the work quarters too, where anything good and legendary truly gets done.